Less than two weeks after SpaceX’s blockbuster market debut, the company’s share price fell sharply amid a broad selloff in technology stocks, wiping more than $350 billion from Elon Musk’s personal fortune. The article says the market value erased from the company reached about $600 billion over the last three trading days.
When SpaceX began trading at the start of the month, it set records and briefly made Musk the first person in history to cross the $1 trillion mark in personal wealth. On its first trading day, the stock rose from $150 to $161, giving the company a market capitalization above $2.1 trillion and making it the sixth-largest company in the United States. Forbes at the time estimated Musk’s net worth at about $1.1 trillion.
By Tuesday’s Nasdaq open, however, the shares were trading around $151.90, down more than 16%. The drop came during a volatile session for tech giants including Nvidia, Tesla and Oracle, as investors questioned huge spending on artificial intelligence development financed with debt.
This week SpaceX said it planned to raise money through a bond issue, in part to fund AI development. Swissquote senior analyst Ipek Ozkardeskaya said the move “revives concerns among investors that big technology companies are spending excessive sums on AI infrastructure and are increasingly funding it with debt.” deVere Group CEO Nigel Green said AI has become an overcrowded trade and warned, “When everyone holds the same stocks, the exit door gets very narrow very quickly.” Musk holds about 38% of SpaceX, including 4.8 billion shares and 350 million options.